Final Thoughts
by Skoobles
Summary: As the end draws near, Jack struggles to discover who he truly is. Please r & r.
1. The Curse

Alright, this is my first attemt at a fanfic, so bear with me. This is my perception of some of the conversations between Jack and Atlas after Jack breaks his mind control. **Please read and review.**

Disclaimer: I don't own Bioshock, I just play it.

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_"A man chooses. A slave obeys."_

That was the sole thoughtthat ran throughJack's mind. He had finally succeeded in killing Ryan, only to find that Altas was the real villan. It had all been a lie, all just a trick to hand Rapture to Fontaine on a silver platter.

_"All this time, I've just been doing what Fontaine told me to do. I didn't even give a second thought to what he said. All he did was manipulate me to sieze power for himself. Did I even stop to think if I wanted to kill him?Ryan was right; I am just a slave."_

At least Ryan had at least given Jack consiousness to the fact that he was being manipulated before his death. Jack suddenly saw the irony in the fact that his enemy had helped him more than his ally. Now that Tenebaum had undone some of the mind control, Jack saw how blind he had really been.

Jack's thoughts were interrupted by crackling from his short wave radio.

"And now, you got hooked up with Tenebaum, huh kid?" came Fontaine's voice. "She's a regular Mother Goose."

Jack lifted the radio to his mouth. "It's over Fontaine. I know now, and I'm done running errands for you."

"Alright kid, fun's fun. But now, go get stepped on by a Big Daddy, _would you kindly?_"

Jack smiled. "I'd love to, but I'm late for a much needed appointment of kicking your ass."

_"Would you kindly. Why had Fontaine chosen that phrase? It would be just as easy to have used any other phrase. Why not 'Please,' or someting like that? Maby Atlasjust used that phrase often. Or maby he feared that if he used a less subtle one, I would catch on. Or maby he respected me enought to be polite in his commands. Or maby he thought that there was some civility left in this ghost of a city."_

_"Or maby he was just one insane damn psycopath."_

There was silence on the radio for a short period.

"I said, _would you kindly_ - go get _stepped on_ - by a _Big Daddy_!" Fontine hissed.

"I don't think so, Atlas," came Jack's reply. "You don't mind if I still call you Atlas, do you?"

When Atlas spoke, his voice came dripping with bliss understanding, and a sense of...understanding.

"Ah, I see. Mother Goose has been messing with your egg salad. Fine.You don't wanna play that game kid, don't worry. I got others."

"Do your worst Atlas," Jack said. That moment, he felt a sharp pain in his chest. He sank to the ground, clutching his heart.

_"What did he just do to me?"_ Jack thought. He had never felt any pain this bad.

"There. I've told your brain to tell your heart to stop beating." Atlas was practically laughing now. "Don't worry, the heart's a very stubborn organ. It won't stop beating...at least not yet."

Jack foguht against the pain. Every breath felt like his lungs were being gored open with a knife. "Damn you Fontaine!" The radio died as Atlas left everything else unsaid.

_"I need to find that dose of lot 192. If i don't, I'll never be free from this."_

With great difficulty, Jack stood up and set out to find the antidote for Fontaine's control.

_"Now we do things my way Atlas."_


	2. The Guide

Ok, since I didn't get any reviews for my first chapter, I'll assume it was becasue of my bad summary. Once again:

**Please read and review!**

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Jack took cover behind a broken pillar as bullets exploded around him. Two leadhead splicers had him pinned down, and were now advancing on him with their machine guns. Jack blindfired with his own gun, but the only result was´wo round slamming into his chest and knocking him to the ground. Luckily, the Big Daddy suit he just recently donned protected him from any serious damage.

The splicers saw he was hit, and now began to target the Little Sister he was guiding. The small, fragile form was preoccupied with extracting ADAM from a corpse, and took no notice of the gunfire.

"Look Mr. Bubbles, it's an angel," cried the little one. The splicers were almost to her now.

Jack³crambled back under cover, and peeked out just enought to see the enemy's feet. He readied an©ncinerate plasmid.

_"Just a little closer..."_

The Little Sister finally acknowledged the splicers, and began to cry out.

_"Almost there..."_

The splicers abandoned all caution as their desire for the ADAM grew ever stronger. They rushed in carelessly©n a wild attempt to overtake Jack and the treasure he gaurded. They didn't notice the oil covering the ground until it was too late.

_"Now!"_

Jack sprang out and fired the plasmid. The fireball ignited the petrolium, catching the splicers in its blaze. The two firey forms threw down their weapons, and¤oce into the nearby pool of water. Jack switched to his electo-bolt plasmid, and gave the water one short charge, frying the two splicers.

_"Damn, these two were tough. And they just keep getting stronger..."_

Jack shook the thought from his head and followed the Little Sister who had now moved across the carnage. The Little Sister opened the door, bringing them one step closer to Atlas. The radio crackled with the all too familiar voice.

"I really had you going with that family bit, didn't I kid?" teased Fontaine. "Oh, my sweet Veruca! Gone forever! Oh my sweet baby Patrick!" Fontaine laughed.

Jack didn't. "You're sick, you know that? Did you just do it for kicks and giggles?"

Fontaine didn't answer the question, but instead, kept on mocking Jack. "Maby I will have a family some day kid. But first, I have to kill you."

Silence filled the air as both men grew�empty of words. Jack galnced down at the Little Sister again. Suddenly, a question burned in his mind, a question that seemed to make all of the difference as to whether Jack would succeed or fail.

"Hey Atlas. You still there?"

"What do ya want now kid?" Fontine was obviously annoyed.

"The Little Sisters. Why did you let me choose? Why didn't you just say 'would you kindly harvest them and leave the bodies to rot?' Why didn't you take control?"

Fontaine chuckled. "I just wanted to know who you really were, kid. It was an itch I had to scratch."

Jack smiled. "Mark my words Atlas, that's going to cost you dearly."

"We'll see soon enough if it does," Fontaine spat. The radio crackled and died.

Jack moved forward, every step bringing him closer to the inevitable final battle that he knew would come.

_"Yeah. We'll see..."_


	3. The Kill

Alright, this is the last chapter. And I'll say it once again:

**Please read and review!**

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This was it.

This was what Jack had been waiting for. This was what he had been prepared to do ever since he was born. Jack readied himself for the last and greatest fight that he would ever see. Failure was not an option. It was Fontaine's turn to die, and Jack was the executioner. This was his sole purpose in life.

This was his destiny.

_"I've come a long way from the scared little man who stepped out of that bathosphere."_

Jack stepped into the elevator that would take him to the armageddon of Rapture, knowing what he had to do. The doors closed bringing him closer than ever before to his last stand.

_"Or maby...maby I haven't come far at all."_

Jack stopped, and for the first time since he had set out to kill Fontaine, he felt unsure. He asked himself the one question that had eaten away at all men who had ever walked in the world of the living. Why?

_"Why am I doing this? Tenebaum?"_

An image of the doctor's face flashedinto his head. Suddenly, Jack paralleled her guidance to Atlas's mind control.

_"Am I still just a slave?"_

The moment came back tohim like a wave of water crashing onto a rocky shore.

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"The assassin hasovercome my last defence. And now he means tomurder meme. Im the end, what seperates a man from a slave? Money? Power? No, a man chooses. A slave obeys."

Jack stood outside the glass door that lead to Ryan himself. He listened to Ryan's mesmerizing words.

"You think you have memories. A farm, a family, a plane, a crash."

Images of his mom and dad, his home, came rushing back to him. But they seemed so vague. So...unreal.

"Was there really a family? Did the plane crash, or was it hijacked; forced down by something less than a man, something trained to sleepwalk through life until activated by a simple word or phrase."

Memories came rushing to Jack that he didn't know he had. The labs. The experiments. The handgun concealed inide the gift from his 'parents' that he used to take control of the plane.

Ryan stepped out of his office, now leaving nothing between him and the man who had come to end his life.

"Come here, would you kindly. _Would you kindly. _Powerful phrase...familiar phrase?"

Jack then heard Atlas's words echo inside his head. _Would you kindly head to Ryan's office and kill the son of a bitch._

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Jack was suddenly struggling to come up with a reason for him killing Atlas other than Tenebaum. Helonged for an explination that would seperatte him from a slave.He never gave any thought to his motive until now. Was it because he wanted to free Rapture from Fontaine's control? No, that wasn't it. Did he want revenge for the lie he had lived and the slave he had been made? No, still not it. The elevator doors opened and Jack set his eyes on the man in the center of the room. As he looked, he realized why he was doing this.

He just wanted to kill the bastard.

Fontaine spoke as if he had already won the battle. "I remember the day that me and the crowd put you in that sub. You were no more than two. You were my ace in the hole...but you were also the closest thing I ever had to ason. And that's why this hurts. Betrayal, kid. Life ain't strictly business."

Jack ran forward and drove the neeedle into Fontaine's chest. "Time to die Atlas!" Jack spoke with all athourity of fate itself.

The battle was long and hard. Three times Jack drained th ADAM from Atlas, and three times he beat him back into the generator. Jack was wounded twice in the process, but he was willing to die if it meant stopping Fontaine. As Jack drove the needle in Fontaine's chest for the fourth time, he was thrown back by Atlas's force. He lay on the ground, helpless as Fontaine advanced on him. This time, Atlas's voice played the role of fate.

"I had you built! I sent you topside! I brought you back, showed you what you were, what you were capable of! Even that life you thought you had, that was something that I dreamed up, that I tattood inside your head! Now if that isn't family,I don't know what is!"

Jack looked up at Fontaine, and spoke almost at a whisper as a small figure crept up behind Fontaine.

"I do. Family means looking out for one another, caring for one another, setting your family before yourself. All you did was use me like a tool. Tenebaum and the Little Sisters are more family to me than you are."

Atlas laughed, and picked Jack up by his throat. The shadow behind him grew closer.

"Remember that I told you that you to mark my words, Atlas. You didn't, did you?" Fontaine showed a puzzled look at first, but then recognition appeared in his eyes.

The Little Sister drove the needle into Fontaine's neck. He pulled it out, but others ran and drained him as well, adn he was soon overrun. Atlas fell to the floor, dead.

Jack exhaled. It was finally over. He couldn't help recalling some of Ryan's words.

_In the end, we don't make out choices. Our choices make us._

Jack was glad he had chosen well.


End file.
